<p>Oooo! Good letter, jyber 209! And SueinPhilly, it’s so great that he wants your input!</p>
<p>And Novelisto–that is brilliant advice. I will admit here in my relative anonymity that worrying about what will become of what I have written stops me in my tracks fairly often. Now, you might think I mean that I worry nobody will ever read it. No. In my delusion, I skip over the actual writing part, the editing, the finding an agent and a publisher. I skip right to the part where they want me to do a book tour, and hey, I’m busy! My husband travels for work so I’m here alone with the two younger boys. As much as I’d love to do a West coast book tour I really can’t. So yes, I worry about what will become of my writing and how my instant success will complicate my life. I wish I was making that up!</p>
<p>Novelisto, you are so right about writing for those after you’re gone, if nothing else. My dad, now dead, wrote an unpublished book (one of my guilts is giving what I though was a worthwhile, though slightly critical comment, and he apparently dropped the project). Regardless, I can read that book, which I had copied and bound for family members, and his voice, opinions and humor are right there, still to enjoy. You make me want to get at least a few thoughts on paper now-if nothing else to counter the drivel in my adolescent diaries.</p>
<p>Helenback – How 'bout you write the book and I’ll do the tour? I love to travel on somebody else’s dime. Listen, if you write one page a day, at the end of 9 months you’ll have a book, in a year if you take weekends off…that’s all it really takes. Make a time every day to be in that chair writing and make that more important than all the things you’ll think of to do the second you sit down! Believe me…they won’t send you on a book tour until at least your third book so you’ve got a couple of years! </p>
<p>If you are serious about writing and publishing, there are really good groups to help you get going. One of the best is Romance Writers of America…no, you don’t have to write romance to belong. But they know literally everything about getting started in a writing career. </p>
<p>GreatLakesMom – My dad wrote a great book, funny, warm, exciting…would have made a great movie. He sent it in and the very first publisher said make these changes and we’ll buy it. Years later when I found out about this, I asked him why he didn’t proceed. He said ‘oh, they were just being nice…’ (eyeroll) Publishers are never ‘just being nice’…</p>
<p>Let go of your guilt. If your father had really wanted to publish that book, nothing you said would have stopped him. I know too many writers who have been rejected a gazillion times, told they’re delusional by relatives and friends, and keep on trying 'til they get there…a few words from you wouldn’t matter if he’d really wanted it badly enough. Darn nice of you to publish it for him!</p>
<p>Here’s how I get my son to reply to ever one of my e-mails: When I write him, I select the option to get a ‘read receipt’. Then, when he opens my email, I get an automatic reply indicating that he opened it. Then I pretend that its a bona fide reply. <em>sigh</em></p>
<p>^^^
Oh, that’s sad. But funny too. I LOVE read receipts! I have it set automatically so I get them from anyone who uses outlook. I must admit though, that I get upset when it’s clear that my email has been ignored!</p>
<p>A read receipt is a good idea. Then you can be sure that the kid ignored you rather than rationalize that the email was lost in the virtual ether. But I fear my son does not even open emails from mom. I think they are on the “DO LATER” list in his mind. But I am going to try the receipt when he goes back to school for winter quarter.</p>
<p>Today is S2’s last exam (an 8 a.m.). Still have not heard a word from him since he went back after Thanksgiving. I have sent two emails…no reply. In the last one I told him to call me when it’s all over and let us know when to expect to see him. I guess he’s taking that literally. He could come home this afternoon… or not.</p>
I did hear from my son promptly after I had sent that e-mail. His LAME excuse was that he had wanted to experience at least one of every class before filling us in. (First week had been orientation, and we were nearing the end of the second week.) I told him that *some *contact and information would have been welcome – we did not have any “FULL disclosure or NONE” policy. ARRGGHH! He promised to be better in the future.</p>
<p>He is still not good with this, but at least we got the message to him that it does matter to us. He e-mails or IMs rather than calls, but that is fine by me.</p>
<p>Most recently he IM’ed me, following a week of silence, and asked about pickup plans for winter break. (His school is within two hours of our home, so we do tend to provide “chauffeur” service.) I immediately asked him if he had not YET learned that contacts ONLY for service requests were not appreciated. He responded that he had planned to be chatty as well, but had only started off with that topic. I do feel I need to reinforce this point.</p>
<p>So he is still a work in progress (as am I).</p>
<p>I see from the cell phone bills that he is on the phone to his girlfriend for close to an hour a day. But I do not want to position myself in opposition to that relationship – figure that is a sure losing proposition. Plus I do like his girlfriend, and can see how they are good for each other.
I am trying to walk the line between encouraging communication/a relationship, and nagging/bullying him into it. So I try to have interesting details to share on the rare occasions when he does ask about how things are going on the home scene (catching more bees with honey concept). I generally wait for him to contact me. I do have access to his facebook account, so can check there if I wonder if he is alive and functioning. </p>
<p>Not great, certainly not wonderful, but passable. My husband takes this harder than I do – feels that we are “losing him.” But as I try to talk my husband through the process and fill him in on what I have read on CC, it helps me as well.</p>
<p>After I pick him up, we plan to head to a Christmas tree farm on the way home. </p>
I wish I was making that up!</p>